


Day 6 - Role Reversal

by is_a_book



Series: SpideyTorch Week 2020 [3]
Category: Fantastic Four, Fantastic Four (Comicverse), Marvel, Marvel (Comics), Marvel 616, Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Comicverse), Spider-Man - All Media Types
Genre: Bodyswap, First Kiss, Friends to Lovers, Identity Porn, Identity Reveal, M/M, Mutual Pining, Pining, Role Reversal, Secret Identity
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-01
Updated: 2020-08-01
Packaged: 2021-03-05 23:47:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,087
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25553809
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/is_a_book/pseuds/is_a_book
Summary: Johnny’s been wanting to know his best friend Spider-Man’s secret identity for over a year now.  His wish was granted, but not in the way he thought.  After an alien attack, Johnny and Spider-Man are stuck in each other’s bodies.
Relationships: Peter Parker/Johnny Storm
Series: SpideyTorch Week 2020 [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1851709
Kudos: 93
Collections: SpideyTorch Week 2020





	Day 6 - Role Reversal

One moment Johnny was fighting alongside Spider-Man trying to defeat the villain of the week. The next, he awakens back in the Baxter Building, feeling disoriented. Looking around, he was hit with confusion when he realized he was in one of the guest rooms.

His confusion doubled when looking down and seeing what he was wearing: the Spider-Man suit? What the hell happened?

All Johnny remembers was a flash of bright light emitting from the alien they fought and then everything went black. But when did he get in Spidey’s suit? Was it even the real one? Or maybe the alien they fought had the audacity to make fun of them and placed him in a costume identical to his partner’s. Either way, Johnny felt a huge headache coming on.

When he tries standing, he stumbles and falls right back onto the bed. Huffing, he sits up and assesses himself. His balance was off, and for some reason, he felt shorter. Carefully getting on his feet, he steals a look in the mirror, and to his surprise, the suit he is wearing is unmistakably the real Spider-Man suit.

Wait a minute. Spider-Man suit? Different height? He turns around to check-

Yep. One perky little ass, which he’d recognize anywhere from all those hours of staring at it. Somehow, he is Spidey.

Though he really wants to find out Spidey’s identity, he also doesn’t want to betray his best friend’s trust like that. So, he begrudgingly keeps the mask on. With a start, Johnny decides if he’s in Spidey, then Spidey must be in him. He chuckles at the innuendo before realizing there are probably bigger things to be worrying about.

Opening the door to the hall, he runs toward his room, only to end up bumping into Sue. 

“Spider-Man!” she exclaims, “I wasn’t expecting you to be up, how are you feeling?”

“Oh, um, I’m feeling great Sue, I just need to see Spi-Johnny for a minute-” 

“Oh! I’ll show you the way to his room,” she says, already walking towards it.

Johnny wishes she would just hurry up and leave because he really needs to talk to Spidey about this. 

“Thanks, Sue” he spits out instead, though what he really wanted to tell her was to get lost.

She leads him to his own room and finally leaves.

Tentatively raising his hand, he knocks on his own door, not sure if Spidey’s realized the situation yet-- if Spidey’s even in there. He hasn’t thought about what would happen if it isn’t Spidey in his body.

Maybe it was some sort of mass body swap and Ben is in his body or something, or maybe he died and his ghost ended up possessing Spidey. He shakes his head and takes a deep breath. 

“Just knock on the damn door,” he mutters.

Johnny had dealt with a lot of weird stuff in his life, being able to light up on fire and everything, but being greeted by his face was a whole new level of strange. He needs to look up to see his face and his features seem odd since he isn’t seeing them from a mirror.

He snaps out of his trance when he sees other-Johnny waving a hand in front of his face.

“Hello?” other-Johnny asks.

“What? Sorry, I was just looking at my face.”  
“Figures, Flamebrain. Looks like no matter what body you’re in, you’ll always have the same level of egocentrism” 

“Definitely Spidey in there. Could you not use big words while you’re in my body? I don’t think my brain cells can handle it” Johnny laughs.

He is met with a glare as Spidey pulls him into his own room and slams the door shut.

“Woah, Spidey. If you want to try something I’d recommend doing it in our own bodies. But if you want to explore some new kink...” Johnny trails off.

Spidey ignores him and instead paces around the room, murmuring to himself.

“How did this happen? All I remember is blacking out. Can this be reverted?” Spidey asks, clearly frustrated.

“Hell if I know” Johnny shrugs, “maybe we could go ask Reed, see if he’ll have some genius solution to this.”

“You’re right, let’s head to the lab,” 

“Woah, Spidey telling me I’m right for once, that’s a new one! Well, technically I’m Spidey. Wait, hold up, I’m Spider-Man!” Johnny remarks.

“No shit, Sherlock,” Spidey says, rolling his eyes.

“Fuck you, Watson. What I’m trying to say is, I have your powers!”

“We’ve got to get Reed to fix us as soon as possible, come on” Spidey urges.

“Think about it Spidey, you have my powers too! How ‘bout, before getting Reed to help us, we go on patrol? You can’t tell me you don’t want to try flaming on,” Johnny tempts.

“Fine, Torch. But just one lap around the city, then we go to Reed.”

-

One lap turns into two, and two laps turns into almost 4 hours until they stop by at the Statue of Liberty for a break.

“This was fun and all, Spider-Man, but we really do need to find a way to switch back,” Spidey says.

“Alright, Human Torch, but you have to admit, that was awesome! I used super strength! And sure the webbing took a little bit to get used to-”

“A little bit?” Spidey teases, “I think that it took you almost the whole patrol to get a handle on it.”

“Details, details.” 

“I think we’ve stalled long enough, we really do need to figure out how to switch us back.” 

“Yeah, yeah fine.” 

-

“So you’re telling me,” Reed asks, “That after the alien attack where you both ended up unconscious, you two switched bodies?!”

Johnny and Spidey sit on the couch, watching Reed as he paces around.

“Ding ding ding!” Johnny chirps.

“Reed, can you please help us?” Spidey pleads.

“Ok, you’re definitely not Johnny, I can’t imagine him going as far as to say ‘please,’” Reed teases.

“That hurt, Reed, really,” Johnny replies, sarcastically.

“Johnny, because of this body swap, does this mean you now know Spider-Man’s identity?” Reed questions.

Upon seeing Spidey’s eyes widen, Johnny quickly counters with, “Of course not, I’m chivalrous enough to keep the mask on top of what must be a disgustingly ugly face.”

“Gee, thanks Torch, you’re a real sweetie,” Spidey replies.

“Anytime,” Johnny winks.

“If you two are done flirting with each other,” Reed says as Spider-Man blushes, “I want to do some tests to figure out how this happened and how to reverse it.”

-

About an hour later, Reed calls them down to the lab.

“Well, what about it, Reed?” Johnny asks.

“After a good amount of tests, I found that you both have alien matter residing in you, causing your memories and individuality to be in the wrong body” he explains.

“Yeah, yeah, but can you switch us back?” Johnny urges, impatient.

“The alien matter is slowly but surely deteriorating, so once it’s all gone, you both should be back to normal,” Reed continues.

“How soon will that be?” Spidey asks.

“About a week, more or less.” 

“A week?!” Johnny exclaims.

“Yes, and because of this odd alien technology, I don’t think I can do anything to speed up the process.”

-

“Hey Torch,” Spidey starts, as they sit on Johnny’s couch, “thanks, for, you know, not taking off my mask.”

“No problem, Spidey, we’ve been friends for years. As much as I want to know your ‘secret identity’ I trust you have your reasons for not wanting to tell me.” 

“Speaking of, I decided, it’d be alright if you knew.” 

Johnny stands up, surprised. “Really?”

“Yeah, as you said, we’ve been friends for years. I’ve been wanting to tell you, and since we’re body-swapped for a week and all, there’s no way to avoid you figuring it out anyway.”

“So, what now? Can I just take off the mask and look in the mirror?” Johnny questions excitedly.

“If that’s how you want to do it.”

Johnny swiftly takes the mask off and ran to one of his (many) full-length mirrors. 

“Peter Parker? The Bugle photographer?! Doesn’t he- don’t you- hold on. You take pictures of yourself?” Johnny stutters.

“Not everyone is rich, Flamebrain,” Spidey murmurs.

“Well, at least you’re cute” Johnny smirks, regaining his wit.

Spi- Peter blushed, scratching the back of his neck.

“Hey, don’t get all shy on me now” Johnny teases, causing Peter to smile, “God, it’s so weird seeing you controlling my face.” 

“Well it’s not any less weird now that you took my mask off, I’m literally talking to myself” Peter laughs.

“Pete-”

“Nicknames already? You just found out what my real name is.”

“It’s never too early for nicknames, Petey” Johnny deadpans.

-

When Peter wakes up after the alien attack, he finds himself in Johnny’s room on Johnny’s bed and with no Johnny in sight. 

Confused, and with a searing headache, he gets up to find out what happened. But for some reason, everything seems… lower? It’s then that he realizes something’s off.

First of all, he appears taller, and second, he feels weaker, as if his super strength disappeared. What did that alien do to him?

He unsteadily walks toward the dresser, grabbing on to gain some balance. Above the dresser is a mirror in which he met a familiar reflection, but oddly enough, it wasn’t his. 

Why’s Johnny fucking Storm’s reflection staring back at him?! 

He pulls a couple of faces, trying to see if Johnny’s face would imitate them, and sure enough, it did. Quickly realizing that if he was Johnny, Johnny must be him, he runs to leave the room only to be interrupted by a knock. 

Opening the door, he sees his own face—well, mask—staring back at him.

-

Sue finds that Johnny was acting differently after the alien attack. Whether it was just due to him being unconscious for a bit or something else, she doesn’t know.

Though, she guesses it probably had something to do with Spider-Man hanging about. She noticed his crush on the superhero a few months back, even though he was too scared to act on it.

She walks into the living room, planning on talking to him about it when she sees Johnny watching Jeopardy. He hates Jeopardy and only watches it to make fun of the nerds that play it. But here he was, watching it alone with no commentary to go along with it.

“Watching Jeopardy?” She teases, knowing he’d be mortified at being caught enjoying it.

Instead, he simply nods, continuing to watch.

Obviously, something was off with him.

“Johnny, you know that if you ever want to talk…”

“About what?”

“Don’t act oblivious, you know what I’m talking about.”

Upon seeing Johnny’s confused expression, she continues with, “look, I know that you have a crush on Spider-Man, all those late nights on the Statue of Liberty? Blushing every time he enters a room?”

Sue smirks as Johnny flushes, “Sue! I don’t have a crush on him, trust me! We’re just, um, good pals! Yeah, my good pal Spidey!”

“Yeah, sure Johnny” she counters, walking out. Yep, his acting weird was definitely due to his ‘good pal Spidey’.

-

After that embarrassing encounter with Sue, Peter can’t get the possibility that Johnny might have a crush on him out of his mind. 

Though Peter would rather die than admit it, he’s been crushing on the superhero since only knowing him as ‘that cool flame dude on TV’. There couldn’t be any possibility that Johnny actually liked him as more than a friend, especially now that he knows his true identity. 

Peter’s just a broke photographer who takes pictures of himself, how much more lame could a person get? Damn Sue for getting his hopes up that someone like Johnny could actually like him as anything more than a friend.

His overthinking is interrupted when something drops from the ceiling, causing him to let out an undignified shriek.

The thing that dropped from the ceiling turns out to be Johnny messing around with Peter’s powers, scaring him half to death. Johnny, in Peter’s body, starts hysterically laughing at his reaction.

“Peter, oh my God Pete-, I didn’t-, I didn’t even know my voice could go that high!” Johnny gasps between laughs.

Peter, now calm, glares at Johnny, waiting for him to stop.

“Ok, ok I’m done” Johnny snickers, taking a deep breath.

“Petey, that was so embarrassing for you!” 

“Ugh, it’s not my fault I don’t have my spidey sense anymore. Do you think that shriek was embarrassing? Sue talked to me today about something… interesting” Peter grins.

“Now I’m scared, what’d she tell you.”

“That she thinks you have a big ole crush on me.”

Instead of the laugh Peter’d been anticipating, he’s met with a blush spreading across Johnny’s, well technically Peter’s, face.

“Wait, do you actually like me, Johnny?” Peter asks, laughter aside.

“What? No, of course not” Johnny declares, stalking out of the room.

-

Fucking Sue and her perceptiveness, telling Spider-Man, Peter, that she thought he had a crush on him. Honestly, who wouldn’t like Spider-Man? He’s cool and funny and his powers are awesome! And unlike Johnny, who is arrogant about his superhero status, Peter hides behind a mask, something Johny could never even imagine doing.

Then, Johnny just had to run out of the room instead of laughing it off as he should have. Why didn’t he just laugh it off?! That way, Peter probably wouldn’t be suspecting that he really did like him as more than a friend.

Johnny buries his head in his hands when he realizes he sounds like some 14-year-old girl obsessing over a crush. 

His wallowing is interrupted by a knock. When Johnny doesn’t say anything, the person knocking walks in, revealing himself to be Peter. 

“Hey,” Peter says, sitting next to him on the bed.

“Sup,” Johnny replies, regaining his demeanor. 

“Are you okay? You sort of ran out there.” Peter implores warily.

Johnny stays silent, unable to come up with a witty reply.

“Could you at least tell me what I said?” 

“Look, Peter, I know it’s fucking embarrassing alright, but I- never mind, I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Ok, I won’t push, I’ll be in the living room if you need me.”

-

Peter feels like a piece of shit. He has no clue what he did wrong, it couldn’t be from him mentioning Sue’s thoughts about Johnny liking him, could it? Maybe Johnny was against it being insinuated that he’s gay? Or he just felt repulsed at the fact that it was Peter she talked about. Nerdy little Peter who has nothing except for some spider getup and a neighborhood superhero gig.

Or Peter is just overthinking and it was something else completely, something that had nothing to do with what Sue said.

Knowing there was no point in putting so much thought into it, he busies himself with watching some more TV until he grows tired enough that he accidentally falls asleep on the couch. 

\- 

Johnny comes downstairs only to find Peter sleeping on the couch with the TV playing in the background. Contemplating how weird it is to be watching his own body sleeping from an outside view, he turns off the TV and places a blanket on Peter.

When talking to Peter, even with them occupying the wrong bodies, Johnny can tell it’s him in there. It’s hard to explain, but his mannerisms are so inherently Spidey that it’s hard to miss them.

He hears Peter stirring under the blanket and groggily open his eyes. Ugh, Johnny does not look attractive when he wakes up. 

Peter looks shocked for a split second before remembering their situation. 

“I thought it was a dream,” Peter groans.

“That’d be more convenient” Johnny jokes.

“Hey, are you alright? You were acting a bit out of sorts earlier. I know I said I wouldn’t push, but seriously, if you want to talk I’m here.”

Johnny contemplates letting it go, leaving the room again, or countering with some stupid quip. But Peter’s worrying expression, even if it isn’t with his own face, compels him to just blurt it out.

“Look, Sue was right okay! I- I have a crush on you. Obviously I didn’t want to tell you cause it’ll make things awkward between us. It’s fine if you don’t want to go on missions with me anymore, I won’t be offended.”

“Johnny-”

“You don’t have to say anything, Pete. I’ll just go.”

“Johnny wait! I like you too.”

Now that’s not the response Johnny expected. He stares at Peter who’s blushing. Johnny didn’t even know his face could blush like that.

“Dude that’s so embarrassing for you,” Johnny laughs.

“Um… what?” 

“You have a crush on me.”

“Yes? But so do you? I thought?”

“But you’re Spider-Man.”

“Well, yeah.”

“I mean like, you’re just so much better, you know? Like, you do all this, with a mask, without getting any recognition for it. You’re also crazy smart, you help Reed on projects. Me? I’m just an attention seeker who lights himself on fire,” Johnny grins, nervously.

“Johnny, are you serious?” Peter scoffs, “You’re brave and courageous, and loyal and honest, and the best friend anyone could have. You might be a little bit of a hothead-”

“-oh no, not the Human Torch jokes,” Johnny groans.

“Anyway, Torchy, you’re awesome. So I don’t know what kind of self-deprecating bullshit you’re spouting but no one can convince me that you’re not amazing, including you. It also helps that you’re hot.”

“Shut up.”

“Why should I?”

“Because you’re making me want to kiss you but it’s not like I can kiss my own body.”

Peter’s confident facade fades as he scratches the back of his head and dips his head to hide his blush.

“Let’s just hope this wears off soon,” Johnny smirks.

-

Five awkward days pass where Johnny and Peter attempt to get used to their temporarily new bodies, especially in combat. 

Let’s just say, there might’ve been a segment or two in the news about the Flaming Torch struggling to fly in a straight line and Spider-Man not being able to use his web-shooters.

Jonah Jameson might’ve scolded ‘Peter’ for his lack of good photos while ‘Johnny’ accidentally burnt his clothing off.

But all in all, with the accidents and odd moments, the boys learn a few things about each other.

So, when they (finally) switch back, Johnny grabs Peter’s face and pulls him into a long-awaited kiss.

**Author's Note:**

> lots of thanks to my beta reader because i don't know how to write


End file.
